I have asked my grandmother a series of questions about her and her family and about one significant tragedy that has played an important role in her long and prosperous life.






Personal Interview with my grandmother, Jean.

When were you born?
January 14, 1944. I am from Lee County, Virginia.

What was your childhood like?
My dad left when I was probably 4 and I don't remember ever missing him or being sad. I was always a happy child. I did not enjoy having my step-dad around, though.

How many brothers and sisters do you have?
3 brothers. Roy, Jim, and Jack. Only Jack is still alive. 1 sister, Melinda who is also alive and well.

What was your first marriage like?
We got married when I was 15 in 1959 and it lasted 14 years. His name was Burt Fraley. He drank a lot, but we had a few good years. He was in the military so we traveled a lot and I loved seeing all of America. We lived in Alaska for quite some time. He was cruel at times with his words, and that made me pretty miserable. I wanted a good man that didn't drink or curse and went to church. I also had my first daughter with him.

Where did you work in Alaska?
I worked for the United States Air Force as a telephone operator and a few other small jobs.

Where did you work when you returned home?
I became pregnant and didn't work for a while. After that you went to college for 4 years. Two years were for business management and the other two were to become a Physical Therapy Assistant. I've been a Physical Therapy assistant since 1985 and have recently retired.

How has your second marriage been?
It's been a short 36 years and I've loved every minute of it.

How did you meet my papaw?
I went to work in the store that he was working in 1973. He had recently came back from Vietnam and we got married a year later. After our wedding we came home and cleaned up our new house the rest of that day. We have had one daughter together named Laura, your mother.

What world crisis' have you lived through?
Nixon was impeached from office after the watergate trials and Ronald Reagan got shot a short time after that. I think the worst crisis was on 9/11 and i always remember my mom on that day because that was her birthday. A tornado came and tore half of the roof off of our house, even though that isn't a world crisis, it was pretty scary to us.

What has taken a toll on your marriage?
Nothing imparticular. I think trying to raise two children was pretty hard a lot of the times and most of the time, I was in the wrong and I know that now. We fought for a few good years, but I stayed by his side and we eventually got over all of our little fights. I totally believe in families and sticking together.

My Grandmother had a brother that was four years younger than her, but he was always protective of her. She recalls a specific story of when she was roller skating and a little boy ad pushed her over. Her brother, Jim, chased him down and beat him up. She says that everything they did, they did it together. Sometimes they would argue, but most of the time, they got along. My mamaw says she had gotten mad at her step-dad once and stole twenty dollars. Her and Jim ran away and she bought him an umbrella and a plastic scarf for herself at a gas station. They hitchhiked and lied about where they were going to and eventually, they were in Appalachia. Ironically, the man driving them knew their grandfather and called him whenever he dropped my mamaw and her brother off. They went to a little restaurant and were eating hamburgers when my mamaw noticed a women in the back pointing at them and then pointing at the phone, so they ran out and walked a couple miles to their Uncle Abe's house and he then took them to a cousins house. When they arrived there, their parents were called and they got a big whipping. My mamaw says that they were always looking for adventures. She also recalls when she was about 10, making her brother 6, her step-dad whipping her for something her little sister had done and Jim, being so little, jumped up on the table with a butcher knife and told him to let her go or he would cut his throat. She says she does not remember ever getting whipped again after that. Soon after when she was 15, she got married to her first husband and left home for about 10 years while traveling America and living in Alaska. When she returned, she says that her and her brother just did not know one another anymore. He had gotten himself in with the wrong crowd and was constantly in trouble. He then joined the Army and was in Korea for a couple years. When he returned, she says he seemed to always be mad. he got married and had a daughter. His wife eventually stopped living with him and he was having a really tough time. My grandmother has remarried to the man of her dreams when she moved back to Jonesville and at the time, he was sick with the flu. My mamaw called her brother to ask if he could get her some whiskey since no one in Lee County sold it. It was around 4:00 p.m. and she was taking a nap, while she was sleeping she says she had a dream that she was having a conversation with Jim and her older brother  and they were talking about how they were afraid to die; Jim had said in her dream that it was not so bad being dead and she remembers asking "how do you know"? She was then awakened by her first daughter saying that she was wanted on the phone. Her brother Jack was on the phone and told her the devastating news that Jim had shot himself and was in the hospital. During that time, Jim had asked his wife to, whom was cheating on him, to come home with him and she told him that she wanted to stay with her friends instead. He went only 2 miles down the road to an abandoned car garage in Pennington Gap and had shot himself in the head. My grandmother was told that his estranged wife had found him. She remembers telling my papaw on the way to the hospital that Jim was dead and she was regretfully correct. Jim was 38 years old and it was 1987 when he died. This event had changed my mamaws life forever and she says losing someone in your family by their own hand changes you and stays with you for a very long time. People in the family had said that someone had shot him, but nothing was ever proven. My mamaw says that telling her mother was an awful thing to experience and she has never seen anyone cry so much. Her mom, after many other illnesses throughout her life, died 5 years later of brain cancer.

My Grandmother. Annie Jean Collins.